It was a good thing her first meeting went so well because it left her unstressed for the next.

  The Luo representative was housed in more modest accommodations than the Bao. Rather than a house, they set up a number of tents surrounding a larger pavilion made of a thicker sort of cloth. If she remembered her lessons correctly, the Luo controlled a fair amount of pasture land; they and their subordinates bred a few particular types of livestock with special properties. It would make sense for them to use their own products.

  The guards at the Luo’s entrance were dressed more like woodsmen than city guards. They had been less polite in their greetings, though still within the bounds of propriety. Ling Qi had been led to one of the side tents to wait on the arrival of their representative. The inside of the tent was comfortable enough, the bare ground covered by thick rugs and colorful cushions, and was lit by the soft light of a floating paper lantern suspended in midair.

  Ling Qi thought as she settled in to wait.

  her spirit sent back.

  Ling Qi restrained herself from snorting at that half compliment. She couldn’t gainsay the spirit though. It was still difficult not to slip back into more casual modes of speech by accident. She turned her attention instead to Zhengui and prodded him with a feeling of concern.

  he replied in her thoughts, sounding distracted.

  Now that they were away from the Bao’s garden, Zhengui had returned to being on edge about the sheer number of powerful people she was surrounded by. There was little she could do to reassure him on the matter, not when Ling Qi was bothered as well.

  Ling Qi was distracted from her thoughts when the tent flap opened, revealing one of the lightly armored guards holding it open for a much older man. The Luo representative, Luo Jie, was a spindly sort to her eye. He had long limbs and a thin build, partially concealed by the ankle-length cloak of soft leather worn over his shoulders, concealing the rest of his attire. Luo Jie had narrow, severe features, marked by a surprising amount of wrinkles for a cultivator, mostly around his mouth and at the corners of his eyes. His head was clean shaven and bare, but a long thin gray mustache framed his frowning lips.

  Ling Qi rose to her feet and offered a bow to the elderly cultivator, trying to ignore the man’s unsettling aura. Luo Jie’s aura felt like being alone and unarmed in the woods at night while predatory eyes gleamed from within every shadow. His realm of power was unreadable.

  “Eight Maiden’s blessing on you, Sir Luo,” she said calmly, Sixiang’s murmurs feeding her the right words. “I offer my gratitude for this meeting, and the chance to offer my Lady’s regards and well wishes.”


  The older man’s head tilted slightly, his already half-lidded eyes narrowing further as he examined her. “May the Dreamer’s attentions remain benign, child,” he grunted, offering only a perfunctory nod in response to her bow as the guard allowed the flap of the tent to close behind him. “You are Baroness Ling then?”


  Sixiang felt a little huffy at his response, but Ling Qi forged on. “I am, Sir Luo. I hope that my presence is satisfactory.”


  The old man waved a gnarled hand dismissively, picking his way across the thick carpet. “I accept your Lady’s intentions. The question is, do you know them?” he asked, fixing her with a look that told her that he was not yet impressed.

  Ling Qi hesitated before straightening up and meeting his eyes. In a more normal situation, it would have been rude, but the families that followed the older ways had their own traditions. “Lady Cai believes that I can more easily relate to you and yours given my own affiliation with the moon.”


  Luo Jie smiled thinly in response. “You have a maiden with you, true, hiding in your thoughts, and the scent of moonlight on your skin. Do you imagine that privileges you, Baroness Ling?”


  Ling Qi listened to Sixiang’s whispers as she considered her answer. “Sir Luo, I am not of any of the old families, but I do regard the spirit we both revere as a patron. I cannot say I understand all of the differences between your ways and others. I have only just begun to learn the Imperial ways after all,” she began answering, emphasizing that at the moment, she didn’t have a side. “I am, of course, willing to receive instruction on these matters.”


  The older man crossed his arms under his cloak. “Mmph, good enough,” he muttered before seating himself cross-legged atop one of the larger cushions. “Any voice not entirely bound by that rigid mindset is a boon. See that you retain your flexibility going forward.”


  “You can see which moons smile upon me, Honored Elder,” she replied mildly at Sixiang’s prompting. “I will not lose sight of the value of an open mind,” she finished, seating herself across from him.

  Once again, he gave her a thin smile. “Under blinding light, there is little room for shadows, sleep, and secrets. Be careful in your doings.”


  “Of course, Sir Luo,” she said. “I thank you for your advice.”


  “Regardless, I accept your Lady’s gratitude and regards. Were there other matters you had to speak of?”


  “Only a few,” Ling Qi said. “First, I have a proposal from the Wang clan regarding new livestock populations captured in recent action against the Cloud tribes. Lady Cai believes this may serve to improve provincial unity, so she asks that you will give the matter some thought……”


  The rest of her meeting went by quickly enough with the taciturn Luo representative agreeing to consider the matters Cai Renxiang had asked her to bring up. Soon enough, she was on her way, dismissed from the Luo compound and its slightly unsettling inhabitants.

  She had her final, most difficult task left. How Ling Qi approached the Golden Fields contingent would likely serve to bias future interactions with them. The Golden Fields counted among their number people from the Han, Fan, and Gu, not to mention one of the grandsons of the current Duke Guo. Cai Renxiang had asked her to secure an invitation to meet with the Guo.

  She had the most ties with the Gu clan; she was close friends with Xiulan, and she had parted with Gu Tai on good terms. In addition, the representative was Xiulan’s mother, which gave her another connection.

  On the other hand, the Gu were the vassals of the Han, and bypassing the Han like that could be considered rude. But she wasn’t as close with Han Jian, so she wasn’t sure if they would be willing to introduce her to the Guo.

  Ling Qi thought over the possibilities with a frown. In the end, she was probably going to make someone unhappy. Of course, she could just go straight to the Guo, but even as a representative of Cai, that was audacious given her own rank as a Baroness.

  Since her goal was to secure a meeting with the Guo, it made simple sense to go to the family that was most likely to allow her to do so. It would allow her to pay respects to the mother of one of her best friends, and doing so would be a show of filial piety, making the choice to go to the Gu fairly uncontroversial.

  She walked through the sweltering heat of the Gu’s “travel home.” It was smaller than the Bao’s near palatial residence had been, but it made up for it in exoticism. It was a single story building crafted whole from the bones and gleaming red scales of a potent spirit beast. Radiant qi emanated from every surface in its interior.

  The Gu guardsman escorting her, dressed in a colorful panopoly with his face concealed behind a crimson headwrap and scarf, seemed unbothered by the heat despite being a realm below her in cultivation.

  Sixiang mused, looking out through her eyes at a wall hanging depicting a phoenix rising from a barren field, streamers of multi-hued fire trailing its wings. Ling Qi had to agree. Even the rich carpet was patterned with rippling lines that called to mind heat hazes and flames. At least Zhengui was finally enjoying himself; the qi emanating from the building had him all but wriggling in happiness in his spiritual form.

  “We are here, Lady Ling,” the young guardsman said as they arrived at the end of the hallway before a doorway blocked off by a curtain of diaphanous silk. “Lady Ai will receive you inside,” he continued, standing aside to give her room to pass.

  Ling Qi nodded, taking only a moment to prepare herself. She knew very little about Ai Xiaoli, Gu Xiulan’s mother, aside from the fact that she was originally from the Celestial Peaks and had exacting standards about appearances.

  Stepping forward, Ling Qi parted the curtains and stepped inside to find herself in a richly appointed sitting room, not too dissimilar from what she had seen in the Bao residence. She did not let her attention linger long on the decor because the woman, a fifth realm cultivator, seated comfortably on the other side of the small polished table that served as the room’s centerpiece demanded attention.

  Her first thought was that Xiulan’s mother looked like a porcelain doll brought to life. Ai Xiaoli was a petite woman, even shorter than her own mother, and was elegant in appearance. She was pale, but not unnaturally so like Meizhen, and her raven black hair shimmered like silk in the light of the room. There was a faint chiming from the dangling ruby earrings and jade ornaments in her hair as the woman turned to look at her.

  Then Ling Qi blinked and she was simply looking at soft brown eyes beneath long eyelashes. Hastily, Ling Qi bowed respectfully, struck by a nagging inadequacy now that she stood before the living image of what she had been taught a woman should be. The Duchess’ beauty had been harsh and inhuman – and unthreatening for that. It was irrational, she knew, but it really did seem unfair.

  was a woman who had five daughters? She barely looked older than Xiulan’s elder sister!

  Ling Qi squeezed her eyes shut. Why was she panicking over something so superficial?

  “My apologies,” her host said in a soft voice like the chiming of bells. “That was terribly rude of me.”


  Ling Qi cleared her throat but didn’t raise her head as she scrambled to get her thoughts in order. “You have my gratitude for allowing me this meeting, Lady Ai. May I ask what that was though?”


  “A minor slip on my part,” Xiulan’s mother answered evenly. “My previous meeting was somewhat aggravating.” After a beat of silence, she continued, “You may raise your head, Miss Ling. Please have a seat, and I will send for tea. I am interested in speaking with the girl who has made such an impression on my daughter.”


  Ling Qi wasn’t sure if she believed Ai Xiaoli’s answer. She had never seen a higher realm cultivator really slip up, but it wasn’t as if she had much experience with meeting such people. Sixiang was silent on the matter, and she could tell the spirit was studying her hostess carefully. “Of course, Lady Ai. Gu Xiulan is among my closest friends, and I was pleased to know that you would be here for her.” Straightening up, she took her seat across from the older woman.

  “It is good to know that Xiulan has found another young lady to spend time with,” Ai Xiaoli replied neutrally, reaching out to grasp a tiny jade bell on the table and ring it once. The woman’s dainty hands were nearly lost in the silk and lace of her voluminous sleeves. “She has always had a streak of boyishness in her demeanor.”


  Ling Qi wondered at that. “Gu Xiulan helped me greatly in learning what was expected of an Imperial lady. She took your lessons very well,” she praised. “I am certain she will be more herself when the stress of the tournament is over.”


  The woman regarded her from under her thick eyelashes for a moment, and Ling Qi did her best not to squirm under the woman’s piercing gaze. “I am certain you are correct. Although it hurts to see my child in pain, it is…… a trial she will overcome,” the older woman said, neither her voice nor her expression betraying a single thought. “And I am thankful for the support you have given her in the matter. Unlike some.”


  Ling Qi held in a shudder. Something dark had touched Ai Xiaoli’s voice for just a fraction of an instant. “It might be presumptuous for me to say,” Ling Qi said carefully, “but it is nothing for which I require thanks.”


  Xiulan’s mother considered her. “Is that so? It seems Xiulan is not as poor in her judgement of character as I had worried then.” Ling Qi wasn’t sure if she should be insulted by that statement. It had been said mildly and without reproach, but……

  Sixiang whispered, sounding frustrated.

  Ling Qi tuned out the spirit’s muttering and met her hostess’ eyes, noting the faintest light of amusement there. “Gu Xiulan is hasty at times, but I think her judgement is sound,” she said with just a touch of stubbornness that slipped through her control.

  “Indeed. Hastiness is simply in her blood. She is very much her father’s daughter,” Ai Xiaoli mused fondly. “I think that is enough talk of serious topics for the moment,” she continued as the curtains rustled and a servant arrived to set out the tea.

  Ling Qi glanced at the servant as she finished setting things out and bowed low, receiving only a bare acknowledgement from Xiulan’s mother before respectfully backing from the room. “As you say, Lady Ai,” she agreed. “Thank you for your hospitality,” she said as she took the cup of shimmering green tea set out for her, the cup hot against her hands.

  “You are welcome to it,” the older woman said mildly, leaving her own cup to cool for the moment. “Now, I have heard much of the Sect from Xiulan, but I am certain that she has left things out. Tell me: just what have you children been up to?”


  Despite the gulf in cultivation and age between them, Ling Qi recognized the expression so similar to the one Xiulan wore when seeking gossip. Iin some things, Xiulan still took after her Mother. She had no doubt that the woman across from her was fishing for more than personal amusement, but she had no reason not to share. “Well, there are a few things Xiulan might not have been privy to,” Ling Qi replied, taking a careful sip from the steaming cup. The heat of the tea made her mouth tingle pleasantly. “If Lady Ai thinks it is important……”


  Her friend’s mother smiled thinly. “Now, now, no reason to hold back, Miss Ling. We are only amusing ourselves after all. I have a tale or to two which might be of interest as well.”


  It was amazing, Ling Qi thought as the two of them began to swap gossip, the commonalities that even powerful cultivators retained with mortals. If Lady Ai’s stories were any indication, Xiulan had been a rambunctious child. It was a little hard to picture proud, self-confident Xiulan skulking her way into the family’s stables because her father had refused to give her a horse of her own when she was six. Getting into fistfights with boys a year or two older and making them cry was a bit more believable. It seemed Xiulan’s temper had actually cooled a fair bit by the time she arrived at the Sect from both cultivation and time spent with her mother.

  In return, Ling Qi shared stories of Sun Liling and the grand “war” between Cai Renxiang and her, and eventually, the meeting ended amicably. She now had an invitation to the gathering the Guo would be holding tonight after the preliminaries ended. She might be starting to get the hang of this after all.

  For now, it was time to put politics out of her head and focus on the preliminaries.

  Threads 187-Return 6

  “Big Sister is worried about something,” Gui accused. They stood on the much abused hilltop where their gardening efforts had taken place. The earth was dark and rich, tilled and fertilized with the shredded remains of their previous efforts.

  “It’s nothing serious, Zhengui,” Ling Qi said. “Just confusing human things.”


  “Yep, just some social business,” Sixiang added. Their voice came from the tiny projection seated on Ling Qi’s shoulder. “You didn’t miss anything important, big guy.”


  “Are you certain? I, Zhen, did not intend to sleep for so long. It has been weeks, yes?”


  “It has been a couple weeks, but everyone is just catching their balance, and that goes for you two in catching up on your sleep,” Ling Qi chided. “But you’re awake now, and we still have plenty of time to take another try at this garden.”


  “Hanyi is still up on the mountain though,” Gui protested. “Is it really okay for Big Sister to be here?”


  Ling Qi thought of her other spirit. She had checked in on her a few times, but…


  “Hanyi’s figuring some stuff out too,” Sixiang said cheerfully. “She doesn’t need us poking our noses in right now. Besides, don’t you wanna have something nice to show her when she finishes composing up there?”


  Ling Qi let out a breath; Sixiang had told her the same thing. Paradoxically, the right thing to do here was to not keep her junior sister closer. At least right now.

  “Mm, Gui will believe the Sixiang. Did Big Sis collect the boulders?”


  “I did.” Ling Qi patted her storage ring. “I’ll let you decide on the first arrangement. I have some new stanzas I want to arrange. You’ll give me your opinion, right?”


  Three voices rose in the affirmative. Ling Qi was looking forward to this.

  As they worked over the rest of the afternoon and evening, the landscape began to change shape, and from atop Zhengui’s back, she cultivated and played her songs, observing how the flows of mist and cold interacted with Zhengui’s fire and wood qi.

  The Unstoppable Glacier’s March was an art that she had received in her Cai-gifted library. An art of powerful movement and implacable advance, it was perhaps not the best suited to her. But as she wove a melody together with the rhythm of Zhengui’s stamping feet to raise the heated waters that pooled beneath the hill she pondered that.

  Was implacability really unlike her? She was not like Cai Renxiang nor like Meizhen, who better embodied those words in her mind, yet all the same…


  In the cold of a city street, she clung to life.

  In a terrible blizzard of her mentor’s making, she sang.

  A knife dug into her neck, and she grasped the wrist of its wielder.

  In the caldera of a volcano, she faced a superior foe, and ever so briefly held fast

  A glacier moved ever forward. It carved rivers and valleys, shaping the land under it over countless years. Yet, in the moment, it was still to human eyes. She recalled the great glacier the expedition group had passed over, stretching out to the end of her sight, serene and unbreaking.

  Stubborn. She could at least call herself that. Was that not something she shared with her little brother? Although she no longer used the Thousand Rings Art, she could still weather many blows. The art she had replaced it with, the Starless Night’s Reflection, didn’t feel quite right either. She understood the value of silence—without it, any music would just be a meaningless stream of unbroken noise—but she wasn’t sure she cared to make it core to herself.

  Perhaps there was something else there in the spaces between that could be made into hers.

  That was a thought for the future though. Often, she had thought about how her style and that of her brother’s were in conflict, but was defense not a place where it converged? Endurance and regeneration. Resilience and draining. Any wound he suffered, he recovered swiftly, and any qi she spent, she stole back from her foes.

  Green shoots rose from churned black dirt, and roots curled around carefully placed stone. Shoots became saplings and then trees, their fragrant needles flowering across the sky. In the newly made darkness, mist hung low to the ground, and from boiling waters, steam rose into the evening sky. Pale flowers bloomed in the dark, and soft grass spread.

  The other art was the Winter Hearth’s Resounding. This art, too, she had only been practicing for a few months, and her thoughts lingered on it as she wove the walking path through the garden, singing softly in duet with Sixiang to transform the mist beyond the paths into veils of glittering silver where those unwelcome would wander lost and to make that mist which clung to the glassy stone cool and welcoming.

  The hearth was a song of building a home, of placing up walls to keep out the cold and keep in the warm. Its weaves defended her works and made that which she crafted with song and voice harder to tear down. It gave friends a point of warmth to return to and recover from the cold night outside.

  She was not a builder, but Zhengui was. Every day, his control of wood and plants allowed him to craft more elaborate structures from root and branch, and the fire of the earth came at his call. It was not the same as her arts, but it was complementary.

  And that was more important than simply trying to ape her little brother’s themes, even when they did not suit her.

  “No weird storms this time!” Gui chirped. “I think this is a good start!”


  "You see? I, Zhen, did not make anything explode," Zhen said smugly.

  “Yeah, I agree,” Ling Qi said absently, rubbing her hand against his shell. “Let’s take a break while the snowfall settles.”


  Letting out a sigh of relaxation, Ling Qi sat down in the soft grass and leaned back against Zhengui’s side. Just beyond where she sat, the soft earth crumbled away into a deep pool of opaque water that hissed and bubbled with boiling heat, sending streamers of steam up into the darkening evening sky.

  “Hm, you might want some stones poking out of the pool. It’d let you have something growing there for a few spots of color,” Sixiang advised. They sat on her shoulder projecting a fairy-sized body garbed in robes the color of the evening sky.

  “The fire qi in the water means only a few of the plants will work. What do you think, Zhengui?”


  “Red and yellow and orange,” Zhen hissed. “Those should be the colors of the center like a merry fire burning bright. I, Zhen, do not know what plants will achieve this.”


  “Gui agrees with Zhen for once. In the trees and the paths, pale and soft colors are okay, but here in the middle, it should be bright.”


  “It might not be a bad idea to crack open a few other vents throughout,”Sixiang mused. “Little springs of warmth and fire in the dark. I bet we can do some interesting stuff with the weird air from underground if you let me blend in some dream qi too.”


  “Maybe the Ironsign Vines for the pond stones,” Ling Qi offered. “There’s a lot of metal in the waters here so that should give the blooms a nice dark orange color.”


  She cast a glance at the young trees that sprouted up around them, picturing their trunks wrapped in the faintly gleaming vines. If they planted flowers in the clear space around the pond properly, they could probably make something that looked like a flame or a volcanic vent without having to delve too deeply into the earth.

  “Has Big Sister’s cultivation been going well?” Gui asked, shifting his head from atop the low flat stone it had been resting on. “Gui thinks he has been doing good with practicing his growing.”


  “It is,” Ling Qi replied, patting his shell. She knew he didn’t want to feel like he was slowing her down, but the fact that he felt the need to ask was evidence of a problem. “Zhengui, what were you cultivating while we did this?”


  “Smoke and rain,” Zhen hissed. His sinuous body shifted, carrying him out over the steaming waters, black scales skimming the bubbling surface as he luxuriated in the heat. “I, Zhen, do not control the rain, but it comes after the burning anyway. This is the spring. Fire burns away the rotted and the stagnant, ash joins the soil, and the smoke brings the rain.”


  “Gui thinks about the stuff we saw in the many cold places,” he answered in a deep rumble. “Gui thinks it is not bad for needle-y trees to sleep in the winter and the cold. This is not stagnation. It is like the tough trees that are scorched on the outside but alive on the inside. Growing new is good, but so is being very tough! Gui appreciates the needle-y trees more now!”


  Ling Qi leaned her head back and inhaled, taking in the rich pine scent of the new growth around them and watched their branches sway in the breeze.

  “Look at you workaholics. You’re gonna make me feel bad for just playing coordinator here,” Sixiang drawled.

  “Not all of us can be lazy,” shei teased. “Zhengui, what did you think of the glacial valley we passed through at the end of our trip north?”


  “It was very lonely,” Gui said. “Too cold and frozen to change.”


  “Too slow and sleepy. Even Gui and the Sixiang are not so lazy,” Zhen said. “But there were others we passed.”


  Smaller glacial paths existed further north, partitioning wide valleys and plugging passes, surrounded by more fertile growth in soil left behind by their passage.

  “Mm, Gui liked those ones better. You could see where they changed things, and you could see where they were going to change things.”


  “I suppose you’re right,” Ling Qi mused.

  Rather than motion and advancement, perhaps simple implacability was the path.

  “Big Sister might be thinking too much. Gui is just glad that we can do things like this.”


  “I, Zhen, am pleased to work Sister’s melodies into reality,” his other half agreed, curling around her.

  Ling Qi rested her hand on his head and looked up at the night sky. Even if that was true, was it good enough?

  She was thinking too hard about this. Many would call her willful, stubborn, and implacable. That was the thing she most shared with her little brother and could be the vessel by which she could complement him.

  “Gui likes it most when Sister is near but knows that Sister cannot always stay close,” Gui said suddenly. “So it makes Gui happy to make things with Sister.”


  Ling Qi hummed to herself. Maybe that in itself was something to look at. The Hearth’s techniques protected her music but not others’ constructs. Could she do something with that? Infuse her little brother’s constructs, his walls and his spikes, with a bit of her song?

  Why did it seem she never had time to do everything she wished to do?